1 Milliarde Tonnen Pflanzenkohle pro Jahr

Members of the Board of IBI convened in Nanjing, China on October 17 – 18th for their annual board meeting to review achievements and discuss the future direction of the organization. Board members reviewed the challenges and progress in promoting biochar in different policy initiatives in the US, Europe and China in 2016. While progress is being made, the Board would like to encourage greater progress towards building a successful biochar industry. With that in mind the Board has updated IBI’s Vision statement to provide a clear and ambitious goal of „Generating one billion tons of biochar per year within the next 50 years“.

Our Mission: to provide a platform for fostering stakeholder collaboration, good industry practices, and environmental and ethical standards to support biochar systems that are safe and economically viable.

We will need all hands on deck to achieve this aggressive yet achievable goal. We look forward to working with members on strategies to measure and meet this target. A new Development Committee was created to assist IBI with fundraising efforts.

IBI Memberships Now Available!

After temporarily suspending IBI membership, the IBI Board has voted to reinstate a membership model effective immediately. We encourage all those that have yet to renew their membership, to do so now via the IBI website.

IBI Asia Launched in Nanjing, China

IBI and Nanjing Agricultural University (NJAU) launched IBI Asia at a meeting hosted by Genxing Pan, IBI Board member and professor of the Institute of Resources, Ecosystem and Environment of Agriculture. Dr. Pan and his team are providing administrative services to IBI and provide an important link to biochar developments in China and Asia. IBIS Asia will be housed at the NJAU Biochar and Green Technology Center which will include a research and innovation building, office building, feedstock and production floor, exhibit of biochar technologies, training, and lodging facilities, a greenhouse, and a wetland Eco-park. The center will operate with the support and collaboration of with Soiltec China and other organizations producing biochar products.

The 3rd Asia Pacific Biochar Conference 2016 (APBC 2016): A Shifting Paradigm towards Advanced Materials and Energy/Environment Research was held on October 19 – 23, 2016 at Kangwon National University in Chuncheon, Korea. Ron Larson attended the Conference on behalf of the Biochar Journal and has posted his early impressions of the conference. Further analysis and reporting from the conference will be forthcoming in the Biochar Journal.

IBI responds to „Current economic obstacles to biochar use in agriculture and climate change mitigation„, an article in the magazine Carbon Management in September 2016

The study claims to review various biochar attributes and the economic viability of biochar. The call for caution against a blanket recommendation to utilize biochar without consideration of its environmental and economic viability is greatly appreciated. The questions raised are sound, and several caveats on enthusiastic projections of a global biochar industry and a universal benefit to crop yields are well founded. While the authors made a credible attempt in collecting published literature on biochar, their data assemblages are suffering from a simplistic view of how farmers or other stakeholders in a biochar industry would optimize performance of biochar.

The main points that the article presents data compilations for are:

Crop yield increases as a result of biochar are low.

Persistence of biochar is low.

Economic viability is not demonstrated.

Crop yield

The average yield increase with most soil management indiscriminately applied globally will show highly variable and for some possibly very little if any benefit. As an example, many biochars have high pH. Such biochars applied to a calcareous soil will most likely rather decrease crop yields, which does not surprise most farmers. Since much of biochar research has been and unfortunately still is done with little explicit formulation of its anticipated effect to change specific soil or crop processes, the results of the global research effort rather resembles a shot in the dark than a focused research strategy. The disaggregation of current datasets then may serve for identifying avenues where biochar shows promise and where not,- while its average is utterly meaningless. The scientifically much more rigorous meta analyses done elsewhere provide insight in understanding drivers of crop yield changes which an average cannot.

A similarly flawed conclusion could be reached by adding irrigation to any soil world-wide and attempting to conclude from the average global response whether adding water to soil increases crop yield. In some regions, adding water will have great benefits, in others less, in yet others it may even decrease crop yield. Obviously, one wants to assess where water increases crop yield, and further, where it is economically viable to justify the investment in irrigation systems. A global average would probably lead to the conclusion that irrigation is not effective on a global scale, whereas a more nuanced analysis would identify where irrigation can be beneficial. The same point can be made for biochar or any other soil management.

Persistence of biochar

Much has been written about it, and it therefore suffices to consult the relevant literature to identify the misconception that the article propagates. It is undoubtedly correct that thermochemically converted biomass can have a range of different persistence, depending on how it was made, from what it is made, and what environmental conditions it is exposed to. The same crop residue exposed to a humid tropical environment will mineralize much quicker than that exposed to Arctic climates. Similarly, biochar made at 300C from poultry manure will have a very short half-life, whereas that made from woody material at 600C will have a very long half-life. Averaging these values glosses over the known variation in properties that are already used to predict differences in biochar mineralization. It also glosses over the fact that some users of biochar products may add it to soil to address certain soil fertility constraints and may not even be interested in the persistence of the material, for example when short-term nutrient or liming benefits are of interest. In a climate mitigation context, however, the persistence of biochar is certainly of great interest, and there is no ambiguity that biochars can be produced that have 1-2 orders of magnitude lower mineralization than the uncharred biomass, if persistence is of interest.

Economic viability

There is indeed only a nascent biochar industry at best. And crop yield increases of major cereal crops will likely be the last ones to justify biochar additions on mostly already very productive soils. Focusing solely on the lowest value crops is understandably a result of the more abundant data available for cereal crops. The economic analysis of the large variety of biochar systems, however, deserves a much more nuanced analysis than this article is able to contribute.

The IBI Online Biochar Training Course is Ongoing

Gain in-depth knowledge on biochar and biochar systems. Register for IBI’s online course, Biochar Training for Environmental Sustainability and Economic Development. This ten week, ongoing course provides participants an intensive training series on all aspects of biochar, presented by leading biochar experts. Learn about best-science updates on biochar, biochar production and use, how to overcome the barriers to commercialization. 19 separate lessons-each with a subject overview, a recorded audio/video presentation lasting 30 – 45 minutes and quizzes to test comprehension and retention. An optional introductory presentation on the basics of biochar allows participants to start the course with a common understanding. Course materials are presented in a user-friendly online format. Participants can access the course at their convenience over ten weeks and will receive a certificate of completion at the conclusion of the course.

Course materials are based on presentations from the June 2014 in-person biochar training course titled, „Biochar for Environmental Sustainability and Economic Development,“ hosted by the University of Santiago de Compostela, Spain, and developed and presented by IBI and collaborators. For more information on member and non-member pricing and registration, please see: www.biochar-international.org/online_course

Upcoming Calendar Events

22nd session of the Conference of the Parties (COP 22) to the UNFCCC, November 7-18, 2016; Marrakech, Morocco